Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Movie Review: Shoot 'Em Up

Taking a break from the Jackie Chan Festival to clear this off my DVR. It's basically in the same vein as Crank - a video game film. There's the barest hint of a plot, and even the characters don't really bother much with it. Clive Owen's Man With No Name hero just sort of guesses at what's going on and is usually proven right. As the movie goes on, the plot gets goofier and goofier, to where it eventually becomes an annoyance.

Of course, I'm used to watching Jackie Chan movies, which aren't exactly known for their plotlines, either. So, how's the action. Well, as befits a video game movie, it's also goofy. Owen and Giamatti (two actors who really should be above this kind of thing) both take unbelievable amounts of punishment, fire off endless supplies of bullets, always manage to show up at just the right place with just the right weapons, and taunt each other from behind boxes, posts, whatever as they continue to fire at each other. It gets more than a little monotonous after a while (and this isn't even a very long movie). Sadly, the producers try to up the ante a bit at the end, with skydiving duels, broken fingers and blood spraying everywhere, but the effects budget must have run a bit low by then because things start going downhill visually by that point, as well.

In the end, not as much mindless fun as Crank. A valiant attempt, but just not quite there. Two stars.